How One Music Producer Balances His Business (and Life) with the Mailchimp Mobile App

From recording music to taking care of his daughter, the Mailchimp mobile app gives Tre Jackson the freedom to manage his business without putting his life on hold.

One of Tre Jackson’s biggest challenges as a small business owner is carving out time in his busy schedule to run his marketing campaigns. He’s learned to seize every spare moment he can get: Maybe 10 minutes here, 5 minutes there.

Tre leads a few different lives—father to a newborn, founder of his own company, music producer, DJ—that are always intersecting yet separate. Tasks like creating music, recording singer-songwriters such as Chris Brown and Justin Bieber, updating his e-commerce store, and staying on top of his marketing often compete with the larger role of taking care of his daughter.

That’s why he uses Mailchimp’s mobile app: He can connect with customers and keep track of sales without putting whatever else he has going on in his life on hold.

“With everything I do, time is the most important asset I have, and the mobile app lets me maximize my time from anywhere,” Tre says. “During the day I’m usually running my business and watching my daughter, and at night I DJ or work in the studio, so I’m not in front of a computer too much.”

“With everything I do, time is the most important asset I have, and the mobile app lets me maximize my time from anywhere."

Tre’s been using Mailchimp for 2 years, and finding the mobile app has taken a lot of stress out of running his business. There are always things that “need to get done,” and he’s realized that having the freedom to handle his marketing without feeling “chained to a desk” makes him more productive.

Send emails whenever, wherever

A music producer living in Atlanta, Tre (more widely known by his producer name, Triza) founded The Producer Kit to provide people looking to break into the music industry with quality sounds they can use in their songs. He describes what he does in terms of baking a cake: “You need really good ingredients to make a cake, right? So to make a song you need really good sounds to put together. I really just supply the ingredients.”

Something Tre’s learned since starting his business is how important it is to plan the emails he wants to send each week ahead of time. It keeps his marketing on schedule. And combining the mobile app with desktop helps him seamlessly follow through on his plans.

Tre hires a freelancer from a service called Upwork who sets up templates for his emails on desktop, so he can jump into the app to make edits or schedule an email for later.

“I like to make my emails feel personal, so people know they’re really coming from me,” he says. “Having my virtual assistant create the frameworks for all my emails makes it easy to plug in my message and send when I’m in the studio or an Uber.”

“Having my virtual assistant create the frameworks for all my emails makes it easy to plug in my message and send when I’m in the studio or an Uber.”

His emails focus on building a community with his customers rather than on sales. He sends a weekly roundup of all things music called “Dope this Week” to keep his followers engaged, and he likes to provide them with tips on how to produce their own music. And the mobile app helps him manage different audiences in his account, so he can make sure he’s always sending useful content.

“If I have information that’s relevant to both my Producer Kit and podcast lists (Tre has a podcast about music production called UnQuantized, I’ll create an email about it to send to both. I’m just trying to give people as much info about the music industry as I can,” Tre says. “I just keep giving them more until the sales come in.”

Share an experience with your customers

Of course, with the mobile app you don’t need to plan every single email you want to send: You can turn your spur-of-the-moment ideas into creative campaigns.

Tre attends a lot of music conventions where he rubs elbows with other well-known producers, and he likes to send his customers quick emails about the cool people he meets.

“Sometimes I want to capture the energy of these conventions I’m at, and I can’t exactly pull out my laptop,” he says. “I like to take pictures with the people I meet and do a write up, since I can insert the photo directly from my phone.”

And sending these emails has helped him make great contacts and great friends. He’s also become something of a celebrity. “People who are signed up to my list are always coming up to me at these things to tell me that they got my email.”

Find what type of content your audience wants more of

Tre opens the mobile app at least once a day to check the reports for his emails and the Facebook ads he creates on desktop. These reports have helped him figure out what type of content his audience is most likely to respond to, as well as what he needs to keep testing.

“I love using the app to see how well my ads are converting,” he says. “I use Facebook ads to test a bunch of stuff, like blog posts. I’ll test a few different ads about a post, and if I see that a certain ad is getting a lot of clicks, I know to double down on that content.”

Be everywhere without being annoying

“There’s so much competition and noise on the internet, and you almost have to be everywhere without being annoying,” Tre says.

Constant communication is important for keeping his brand and services top of mind in an industry where everyone is always trying to one up each other. The mobile app lets Tre start and stay on top of conversations with his followers no matter what he’s doing.

“I always encourage people to reply to my emails and let me know what they have questions about, what they want me to cover,” he says. “I’ve really gotten to know my customers, and I like to be there for them.”